


How to Blow a Fuck Ton of Meal Points in 1.5 Semesters.

by YourPalYourBuddy



Category: Check Please! (Webcomic)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Fluff, M/M, blatant disregard for how meal points actually work, but here we are, this came from a tumblr prompt and wasn't supposed to be this long
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-11-03
Updated: 2018-11-03
Packaged: 2019-08-17 06:19:46
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,276
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16510958
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/YourPalYourBuddy/pseuds/YourPalYourBuddy
Summary: The cashier stares at the computer screen as they pick up their trays. “Damn,” she says. She glances at Jack and hands his card back. “You’ve got the most meal points I’ve ever seen.”“Oh?”She tilts the screen toward them. “Especially at this point in the semester? Most people are at, like, five hundred? Max? But—”The screen says, Meal Plan: 1938.Bitty, Holster, and Lardo crowd around the computer in something close to awed silence. Jack can almost hear Holster calculating how many boiled eggs that’d buy him.“You have great power,” Holster says finally. His face for once is entirely solemn. “Use it wisely.”______________________Zimbits AU, from Jack's POV. Canon divergent.





	How to Blow a Fuck Ton of Meal Points in 1.5 Semesters.

**Author's Note:**

  * For [pertainstothesea](https://archiveofourown.org/users/pertainstothesea/gifts).



> Inspired by recent events, namely one of my friends trying to use up all of her meal points. The exact prompt is this: [AU in which Jack needs to use up all his meal points so he buys Bitty a massive stash of protein bars.](https://shitty-check-please-aus.tumblr.com/post/179656146326/au-in-which-jack-needs-to-use-up-all-his-meal)

________________________

 

It starts out innocently enough.

____________

 

“Oh no,” Bitty says. His eyes are comically wide as he pats his pockets. “Shit.”

Jack nudges Bitty’s elbow with his tray. “What’s up?”

He’s got nearly all the contents of his pockets out on the buffet counter. “Can’t find my card. I swear I had it, I checked before I left the Haus…”

It’s a split second decision that’s not a decision as much as an absolute, really. “I got it,” Jack says. He shakes his head and shrugs at Bitty’s _are you sures_. “Least I can do Bittle, gotta make sure my liney’s eating enough protein, eh?”

Bitty pours out his thanks as the cashier rings them up. Jack smiles at him, a little uncomfortable by the praise, and he thinks Bitty picks up on his discomfort because he stops abruptly. He thinks maybe they’re both a little red.

The cashier stares at the computer screen as they pick up their trays. “Damn,” she says. She glances at Jack and hands his card back. “You’ve got the most meal points I’ve ever seen.”

“Oh?”

She tilts the screen toward them. “Especially at this point in the semester? Most people are at, like, five hundred? Max? But—”

The screen says, **Meal Plan: 1938.**

____________

 

Samwell has rollover meal points, meaning if they aren’t used the semester they’re meant for they’ll transfer to the following semester. Jack moved to off campus housing his sophomore year when he got his dibs, but his parents insisted on buying him the standard athletic plan just in case he decided to eat on campus.

“And that,” Ransom says, face awash in the glow from his Excel sheet, “is usually, what, a thousand two hundred a semester? Something like that?”

“I didn’t think they’d roll that much,” Jack mumbles. “My parents wanted me to have an option in case I needed food between classes.”

Shitty says, “Brah. All those times I said we should go on dining hall dates, and you said no.”

Bitty, Holster, and Lardo crowd around the computer in something close to awed silence. Jack can almost hear Holster calculating how many boiled eggs that’d buy him.

“You have great power,” Holster says finally. His face for once is entirely solemn. “Use it wisely.”

____________

 

Ransom spends the weekend figuring out how to maximize his points.

“Annie’s takes them,” he says in the living room later, shoving a printout at Jack. It reads, _How to Blow a Fuck Ton of Meal Points in 1.5 Semesters._

“Did you make graphs?”

Ransom ignores him. “It’s a new thing but the Starbucks in the student union does too, and it’s always expensive in the libraries so those are good places to go too—”

Jack turns the paper over. There’s a whole list sorting the prices of all the food sold in every Samwell store from highest to lowest, as well as a five star rating system. It’s bizarrely comforting to know that the only steak available is the most expensive and at two stars; he’s not sure he’d trust the food courts for that no matter what.

“There’s always hella stuff in the convenience stores in the dorms too, so don’t forget those,” Ransom says, pointing to a section titled _Dry Goods_.

Bitty pokes his head in the room. “Did any of y’all use my butter?”

“You know we know it’d be safer to fight a bear than get between you and your butter,” Jack says. “My hands are clean.”

He rolls his eyes. “No pie for you, noted. Rans?”

Ransom hesitates. “If I say ‘of course not,’ do I still get pie?”

“I suppose,” Bitty says. “I’m not heartless.”

“I beg to differ—” Jack starts, but Bitty interrupts.

“Then beg.”

Bitty narrows his eyes at him. The corner of his mouth is twitching, and suddenly Jack has an idea.

“Hey,” he says. “Hey, Samwell owns the Murder Stop and Shop now, right?” Ransom and Bitty nod in unison. “Does that count as a food court now?”

____________

 

Once the groupchat is aware of the spoils to be had, there’s no backing out. Jack tries to embrace the opportunity to spoil his team. He takes the frogs out to Annie’s on Thursdays to get to know them better and hangs with Ransom and Holster in Founders to do homework and relive choice hockey plays. Now and then he makes Lardo take him along when she goes grocery shopping, reminding her that the starving artist routine is a cliche she doesn’t need to live out. He and Bitty have an overlapping free hour and a half between their classes on Monday and Wednesdays, so they grab coffee (Jack) and something sugary that tastes closer to a milkshake than coffee (Bitty).

It feels nice, doing this. He’s not sure why he hadn’t been before.

____________

 

“Yo, Zimmerbabe, buy me some hash while you’re out?” Shitty says one morning. Jack barely opens his eyes, even when Shitty jumps on his bed.

“Samwell meal points won’t cover that, Shits.” He tugs his blankets back over his head, but he moves over enough for Shitty to crawl in next to him. Jack spares a second to be thankful Shitty is, for once, wearing boxers.

“You didn’t let me finish,” Shitty says brightly. He steals Jack’s pillow, and Jack tries and fails to glare at him properly. “Hash browns. Stop and Shop. Please?”

Jack flips him off and Shitty just snuggles against him, and after a little while Jack snuggles back. Before they fall asleep Jack sets a reminder in his phone to take him shopping.

____________

 

 _they sell pads and tampons at all the convenience stores,_ Lardo texts him.

He sends back, _And the good chocolate,_ and she replies with a flurry of hearts. And then, just because they’re nearby and he wants to see if he can, he adds two mugs from Starbucks and three packets of hot chocolate mix.

“Have I told you lately how much I love you?” Lardo asks when he shows up. He waves away her offer to help with the bags. “It’s limitless.”

Jack smiles at her and hugs her gently. “Any time, Lards,” he says, and then makes her go lie down and choose a movie while he gets the hot chocolate ready.

____________

 

He gets a text apiece from Ransom, Holster, and Lardo about trying to buy beer with his points for a kegster and turns his phone on airplane mode for the rest of the day.

____________

 

Midterms change things.

“Are you baking?” Jack says through a yawn. It’s a pointless question; they all know Bitty hates studying, and the closer to midnight it gets the more likely he is to be distracted by Betsy and all the eggs, flour, and butter they have in the kitchen now. The stovetop clock says it’s 11:27 PM.

Bitty spins to face him, his mixer held out like he’s about to club some robbers or something. Jack blinks as bits of whatever he’s making fly off the beaters. He wipes some of it off his face with his sleeve.

“Oh! Goodness, Jack, you startled me.” Bitty sets the mixer down and hands him some paper towels. “What’re you doing up so late?”

Jack gets a glass from one of the cabinets. “Needed water.” He observes Bitty for a second, who tenses immediately and looks away. “You okay, Bittle?”

“Peachy,” Bitty says, but his smile wavers and turns into a frown almost immediately.

Jack leans against the counter, sips his water, and waits.

“You can come back from a D on a midterm,” Bitty says suddenly, his voice deliberately casual. He turns back to his mixing bowl but doesn’t turn the mixer on. “Right? If I just need to pass French?”

Oh.

Jack clears his throat. “How d’you know — I mean. Didn’t you just take that one? They got it back already?”

Bitty nods emphatically. “Scantron test. It’s not a big anything really, I don’t need to do amazing on it, but. I _do_ need to pass, so.” Now he sets the bowl down, and the look he gives Jack is strangely fragile and determined. “I can come back from it, right?”

“Of course you can,” Jack says impulsively. He considers a moment, then adds, “If you — if you want help, or anything, I do speak French, so. Not that I don’t think you can do it on your own because you definitely can. Just an option. If you want it, that is.”

Bitty nods. “Thanks. That’d be good, I think.” He turns on the mixer for a few seconds, then sighs and turns it off. “I don’t think I can finish this.”

That’s a warning sign if he’s ever heard one. Jack’s heart squeezes infinitesimally. He’s not sure he’s ever seen Bitty this upset; he’s not even playing music, Jack realizes with a jolt.

“Hey, wanna give me a hand?” he asks, voice a little desperate. “Suddenly craving a lot of beef jerky.”

“I can’t make you beef jerky right now,” Bitty says without looking at him.

Jack shakes his head. “Not what I meant,” he says, and now Bitty looks up.

He sees the moment Bitty realizes what he means. “It’s, like, thirty degrees out.”

“Still warm for Canada.”

“Not in Georgia,” Bitty says, but he’s putting on his shoes.

____________

 

They have two baskets filled with beef jerky and Bitty still hasn’t smiled. Jack’s beginning to rethink this idea.

They wander around the Shop and Stop while Jack makes up a story about a history channel program he’d ‘seen’ the night before about bread spreads throughout the Renaissance and various historical types of jam.

“Or jelly, I guess,” he says, glancing at Bitty, who nods absently. Jack gives himself a second to be discouraged before saying, “My mistake. But. Jam, jelly, they’re the same thing, really, so—”

This gets Bitty’s attention. _“What_ did you just say?”

Jack waves a hand flippantly. “You know. They’re pretty much the same thing, there’s not much of a difference—”

From the look on Bitty’s face you’d think Jack had suggested they drop out of college to assassinate the president of the United States. _“Excuse me?”_

But it does the trick, Jack thinks. He bites the inside of his mouth to keep from smiling too wide as Bitty gives him a detailed explanation of the differences between the two. It does the trick. Bitty ends up with another basket full of jams and jellies and an impossible amount of blueberries, strawberries, and apricots, a handful of demands that Jack try all of them when they get home, and almost an equal amount of apologies from Jack on simplifying them both so much. After the discount, it comes to a total of $153.78.

They should get into more arguments about jam and jelly if this is how they play out, he thinks, and Bitty laughs out loud when he mentions it.

“What documentary was that,” Bitty asks when they get back to the Haus. “I almost want to write in, if they got it that wrong.”

Jack makes a mental note to buy another fridge as he squeezes the jams and jellies onto what Bitty’s designated as the Refrigerated Spreads Shelf. He moderates his voice as best he can when he says, “I made it up.”

He stretches his back and catches Bitty giving him a weird look. “What? I’m sorry for lying, if that’s what that face is about.”

Bitty visibly shakes himself and busies himself with the beef jerky as he says, “And if it isn’t?”

“Then I’m still sorry,” Jack says. He finds an empty top shelf in one of the cabinets, fills a Ziploc container with as much of the jerky as he can, and sets it up there as carefully as he can.

He thinks he hears Bitty mumble, “That’s not what the face was about,” but Bitty’s declaring how sleepy he is and that Jack will have to try the jams and jellies in the morning because “Jack, you’re supposed to be my captain, how could you keep me up this late?”

“I’ll make it up to you, Bits,” Jack says, smiling softly. “Get some sleep.”

But after they go to their rooms, he stays up thinking about Bitty’s voice when he’d said _I don’t think I can finish this,_ and how much he’d like it if he never sounded like that again. He falls asleep before he can wonder too long on why that is.

____________

 

It becomes a bit of a thing without him realizing it.

Jack wakes them both up for checking practice and, afterward at Annie’s, he hands his card over before Bitty even has a chance to offer.

It’s other places too:

“Let me,” at the Murder Stop and Shop, nudging Bitty’s hand aside.

<<It’s not a problem, promise,>> at Jerry’s after one of their numerous French practices.

“I got it,” at the buffet, both their trays loaded with dried cereal they’ll save for later and plates of eggs and bacon they’ll eat now. Ransom and Holster share a look that makes Jack self-conscious enough to wait by the register for the rest of the team to check out too, as well as ten people after them.

After class on Monday Bitty says, “You don’t have to keep paying for me, Jack,” while drinking his coffee. “I have a meal plan too.”

Jack tries to ignore how that stings a little. “I don’t mind, Bits,” he says. “Pay me back in goals this season, eh?”

Bitty looks a little shy as he says, “Sure.”

Jack holds his cup out. “Here,” he says, and swallows down a smile when Bitty bumps their cups together.

____________

 

 _maple apple or just apple,_ Bitty texts him.

Jack squints at the clock on his bedside table. _3:24?_

_I don’t know that pie_

He laughs a little despite himself. _Go to bed Bittle._

_can’t sleep. what kind of pie do you like_

_I don’t have a favorite,_ he types, then deletes. This feels like something he needs to respond to properly. He tries _if you make it I’ll eat it_ but that seems too close to a different thing part of him wants to say. He deletes that too.

 _Can’t go wrong with apple and maple,_ he sends.

Bitty replies almost immediately. _you got it_

Jack smiles, a wide, sleepy thing, and he falls asleep with his fingers curled around his phone.

____________

 

It tastes better than he imagined. Bitty grins when he tells him this.

____________

 

He still has 965 meal points and two weeks left in the semester, so when Bitty gets hit by whatever virus is going around, Jack makes Shitty and Lardo go grocery shopping with him after class.

“What’s the move?” Lardo asks. She hooks arms them both and nudges them all into skipping a few steps like they’re in _The Wizard of Oz._

“I was thinking eggs,” Jack says. “Breakfast for dinner sort of thing. Maybe pancakes? And fruit. Do either of you know how to make jam?”

Shitty says, “I can do jelly,” and Jack shakes his head.

“Not the same.”

“I’ll check the group chat,” Lardo says. Jack shakes his head more emphatically, and she and Shitty look at each other. “I mean, Bitty would have some recipes, I’m sure he wouldn’t mind.”

“No, I just…” It’s so simple that it’s difficult to put into words. He tries to work his way around this feeling in his throat. “It’s a surprise,” Jack says, his voice going up like it’s a question.

Shitty elbows him. “Are you saying that you, a bodaciously beautiful hockey player who has — and I do say this with love — little to no cooking experience, is planning on making a meal for the single best chef any of us know?”

“I was sort of hoping you’d help,” Jack says a little helplessly.

Lardo observes him for what feels like a whole block but is really only a few feet. “Okay,” she says. “Okay. We’ll help.”

Jack blinks. “Just like that?”

“Just like that,” she says, and she slugs him gently on the arm. “We got your back, bro.”

“Okay,” Shitty says. He stops walking, pulling them all to a stop, and whips out his phone. “Brah, this is Bits we’re talking about, you can’t get stuff nice enough at the Murder Stop and Shop. But … Google says there’s a nice grocery store a twenty minute drive away, and I bet Holtzy will let us take his car.”

“You have a car,” Jack points out, but it’s really only just to distract from how light he’s feeling. _“I_ have a car.”

Lardo turns them all around and starts skipping again. Jack purposefully drags his feet until she shoots him a look, and then he squeezes her arm and joins in.

“Holster’s got a Jeep,” Lardo says, and Shitty adds, “We can put the top down.”

It’s cold, and windy, but they do. They end up sing-yelling at the top of their lungs.

____________

 

The eggs are slightly overcooked. Shitty burnt some of the toast and Lardo under-did some of the pancakes and some of Jack’s bacon looks a little questionable and he forgot to do the dishes beforehand, and Ransom and Holster still aren’t back with the pies from the only shop in town Bitty has deemed acceptable.

But there’s a plate made up with toast that’s more golden brown than burnt and pancakes fluffy enough to be mistaken for clouds and three pieces of bacon crisped to perfection, and that’s enough for Jack. They got the music right too; Jack bought Beyoncé’s full discography and they’re playing _I Am … Sasha Fierce_ at a low volume.

Shitty’s shaking out some hash browns when a sniffly voice says, “What’s all this?”

Jack nearly drops the fork he’s holding. “Bits! I — we thought you were napping,” he says lamely. “The jam isn’t done, you weren’t supposed to see this yet.”

“You’re making jam?” Bitty mumbles, wiping his nose with a tissue. It strikes Jack that he shouldn’t be cute like this, nose red, practically swimming in an oversized Samwell sweatshirt.

It strikes Jack that he does, definitely, think he is cute like this, and he resolves to deal with that later.

“Jam’s on hold for the moment,” Lardo says apologetically. She pours Bitty a glass of orange juice and guides him to the table, where he takes a seat with visible bemusement. “We had some difficulty with the burners.”

“You’re making jam,” Bitty repeats, like it’s a puzzle he’s close to figuring out. He glances at Jack. “Did you do this? Your meal points?”

Shitty says, “Nah, we got the good stuff,” and Jack shrugs like his heart rate hasn’t sped up for no discernible reason. “Real grocery store for our best guy.”

Bitty mouths the word _oh_ like it’s the answer he was looking for. “You didn’t have to.”

“Hey,” Jack says. He slides Bitty his plate and dwells on the amazement on his face far longer than he probably should. “You can tell us you don’t trust our cooking, I think we can take it.”

Bitty laughs a little breathlessly. “Gosh,” he says.

The front door bangs open and Holster yells, “We got a _pie_ up in here.”

 _“Two_ pies!”

Ransom barrels into the kitchen closely followed by Holster. They’re both carrying three cardboard boxes apiece.

“Nay,” Holster says, setting his boxes by the sink and ruffling Bitty’s hair. “Not two, certainly.”

“At least three,” Ransom states, and Holster nods his agreement. “Perchance six pies.”

“You fuckin’ _beauts,_ you beautiful bastards,” Shitty says with a grin. They both take very exaggerated bows. “How’d you do it? We pooled enough for three.”

Jack snags some bacon and pancakes while Ransom and Holster reenact their pie shenanigans. He hesitates a moment before setting his plate next to Bitty, who looks like he’s noticing but trying not to watch him come over. The small part of Jack that’s trying not to trip over his own feet notices that Bitty’s eaten almost everything.

“Mind if I sit?”

Bitty says, “I suppose not,” and smiles at him.

____________

 

 _What holiday movie should we watch?_ Jack texts at the end of the semester. _Parents can’t decide._

His phone buzzes immediately and he practically lunges for it. He ignores the looks his parents give each other in favor of opening Bitty’s message.

_Love Actually? it’s a classic_

“Love Actually?” he suggests, and Alicia hums.

She deftly navigates over to Netflix and says, “Tell him he’s got good taste.” Bob pulls a blanket over the two of them, and she leans against him like they fit perfectly together.

He thinks about perfect fits for a second.

Then he says, _My mom says you’ve got good taste,_ and Bitty sends a selfie of himself beaming. Underneath he’s written _!!!!!!_ His sweater is about as red as Jack feels.

He snaps a picture of his mom giving thumbs up.

When Bitty finds out Jack hasn’t seen it before, he insists upon play by play reactions. Jack does.

____________

 

His family does movie nights every other night on breaks, so after texting for Bitty’s advice on the last four picks, Jack decides to call instead.

Bitty says, “Jack?” like he’s testing how the letters feel on his tongue.

“Hey um,” he says, then winces. He traces the stitching on the couch cushions. “Hi, Bits.”

Alicia mutters something about popcorn and Bob claps Jack on the shoulder meaningfully before following her. Jack puffs out his cheeks at them.

In his ear Bitty asks, “Everything okay?”

“Yeah! Sorry. What do you think about The Nightmare Before Christmas?”

There’s a pause, during which Jack takes a second to curse himself for being so awkward.

Bitty clears his throat. “I think it does excellent double duty,” he says. “It’s hard balancing Halloween and Christmas like that, but it definitely does it well.”

Jack knocks his hand on his knee. “That’s what I said.”

“Well,” Bitty says. Someday, Jack decides, he’s going to ask him how he manages to make it sound like he’s smiling through the phone. “I may be a little biased, but. Seems to me like you’ve got a good head on your shoulders then.”

The sound and smell of popcorn wafts from the kitchen.

Impulsively, Jack asks, “Biased?”

“I — just — you know, because I already said that,” Bitty stammers. “We agree. You’re smart because you agree with me, is what I meant.”

Jack hums. “If I disagreed, I’d have a bad head on my shoulders?”

“Well. No, your face is fine enough—”

“My face is fine enough?” Jack interrupts, smiling himself.

Bitty makes a noise like he choked on a laugh. “Lord, have you seen yourself?”

And, that … that doesn’t sound like teasing.

There’s silence in which Jack desperately tries out a few responses in his head. None of them seem to work. He tugs on the decorative beading on one of the cushions, and it snaps in his hands. He fumbles to catch all the beads before they disappear into the couch.

“Oh gosh, forget I said that,” Bitty says, clearly forcing the brightness in his voice. “I’m a little tired, we’ve been going going going all day decorating like you wouldn’t _believe_ and I’m pretty slap happy right now, I know you _think_ you’ve seen me tired but—”

“Bitty,” Jack says, and Bitty stops talking immediately. He absently rubs the crease between his eyebrows; none of what Bitty’s saying is what he wants to hear, but he’s not sure how to tell him.

Bitty says, “Jack?” and now he hears it.

And when he says, “Bitty,” he knows he’s saying it the same way. He just hopes Bitty hears it too.

____________

 

 _I think I’m in love with Bitty,_ he texts, and Shitty calls him back immediately.

“Whoa whoa hold on backup since when? Jackabee!”

Jack says, “I don’t know when it happened, but. Shits. I don’t know what I’m doing, I’ve never been good at this.”

He’d gone straight up to his room after he and Bitty hung up, waving a vague hand when his parents asked if he was alright. He knows they didn’t believe him — he’d taken the stairs too fast to ignore — but they all three have an understanding where Jack will come to them when he needs too, and they won’t push unless they feel they need to. Jack’s fully expecting them to check in in an hour or so if he doesn’t come down, but in the meantime he needs to calm down.

It’s so stupid that he didn’t realize this earlier. All the checking practices and coffee dates that weren’t quite dates but definitely, now that he’s thinking about it, definitely not just platonic. That breakfast for dinner he’d planned. How warm he feels when Bitty says his name.

A momentary panic seizes him at the thought of what would’ve happened if he hadn’t gone out of his way to spend his meal points fall semester.

He paces around his room telling Shitty all of this and says, “I’ve never felt like this, I don’t have the words for it. And I don’t know how to tell him except—”

He breaks off abruptly, staring at his computer. Light from his desk lamp glints invitingly off of it.

“Except for what? Brah, what’s going on in your head?” Shitty asks, and his tone is so soft and encouraging that Jack tells him.

“I’m gonna buy a plane ticket.”

____________

 

His parents hold hands and sit on his bed as he packs. Alicia made him tea while Bob rubbed his back, and now Jack’s panic has settled into something that’s nervous but certain. He’s got his ticket on his phone and the shirt Alicia says brings out his eyes in his carry on so he can change when he lands. Bob combed through his own history books, selected one about Ancient Mesopotamia, and slipped it into Jack’s bag when he thought he wasn’t looking. Jack’s heart feels so full for his parents that it aches.

“Okay,” Jack says finally. He sets his bag down on his desk and scans his room briefly, then nods. “Okay. I think that’s everything, then.”

Alicia holds her hand out for his and he laces their fingers together. “I’m proud of you,” she says simply. “I can’t wait to meet him.”

“Bring flowers,” Bob suggests. Alicia kisses his cheek, and he smiles and says, “Sometimes it helps to hold onto something.”

Jack nods a little numbly. “Okay,” he says, searching their faces. “Is this … do you think I’m making the right call?”

“Oh honey, we can’t make your decisions for you,” Alicia says gently. She squeezes his hand. “I will say, though, that when you came downstairs and told us, that you sounded more sure of this than almost anything.”

<<You have a good heart,>> Bob tells him. Something in his father’s face makes him want to believe him. <<If this is what your heart is saying, then I don’t think it would steer you wrong.>>

His flight is in three hours. He has a playlist full of Beyoncé and several podcasts on the history of jam and jelly making downloaded to his phone, and Alicia gave him her plane pillow in case he manages to sleep on the plane. The shirt is — he double checks — still in his bag.

The numbness slowly gives way to eagerness, then to surety.

He’s never been more certain of anything; this feels the same way lacing up his skates does, the familiar weight in his hands when he picks up his stick, the lightness when he steps onto the ice.

This is happening.

“I think I’m ready,” Jack says, and his parents wrap him in a hug.

____________

 

He doesn’t sleep on the plane.

____________

 

_Just landed._

Shitty sends back, _good luck!!!_

Jack replies with _ <3 _ and finds the rental cars.

____________

 

It’s 2:14 in the morning when he gets to Bitty’s house. His heartbeat crashes in his ear as he parks the car in front of a basketball hoop just off the driveway, and he thinks how lovely it is the way that the moon peeks out behind the backboard. If he had a camera, he’d take a picture.

Then he remembers that he gave Bitty no warning he was coming, and how late it is, and hopes dearly that he’s still awake. There’s a light on in one of the windows that he thinks may be coming from a kitchen, but.

He dials Bitty’s number and crosses his fingers in his pocket.

“Hello?” Bitty says. He sounds markedly uncertain. “Jack, what’s up?”

He takes half a second to marvel at how, for once, he doesn’t have to think of what to say.

“I needed to see you,” he says. “Right now. If that’s okay.”

“Oh. Oh! Um, d’you wanna FaceTime, or—?”

Jack takes the porch stairs two at a time. “I was thinking,” he says, ringing the doorbell.

“Oh, sweetpea,” Bitty says breathlessly over the phone. Jack hears someone running within the house.

“I thought, maybe,” he continues, and then the door’s swinging wide open.

And then, Bitty’s in his arms, and he’s holding him like he’s wanted to for the past three months, and Bitty’s looking at him like he invented the entire night sky just for them. And Jack knows with a certainty so strong it makes him shiver that he’s looking back in just the same way.

“Hi,” Bitty breathes. “Hi, Jack.”

Jack whispers, “I thought this would work,” and he kisses him.

____________

 

“Oh,” Bitty, whispers, so Jack kisses him again.

He doesn’t bother making excuses after that, and Bitty doesn’t let him.

____________

 

When spring semester rolls around, an additional 1200 meal points are automatically added to his plan.

Ransom updates the Excel sheet with stats like _Where To Go On Cute Ass Dates_ and Holster adds the parenthetical _(Where Lardo Won’t Fine Both Your Asses Off)._ Lardo just shrugs when she sees it.

“I’ll get the deets off Bitty’s twitter,” she says, winking, and gives Jack another hug. “Happy for you, bro.”

Shitty wipes his eyes and ruffles Bitty’s hair, saying, “They grow up so fast.”

“We gotta go, we’ll be late,” Bitty says. He reaches up and tugs gently on Shitty’s hair.

“Using ‘we,’is that a fineable offense?” Ransom whispers loudly.

Holster says, “I’m waiting for them to hold hands, personally,” and Jack just laughs.

He is so, so unbelievably happy.

“You ready?” he asks.

Bitty beams up at him. “Got my list right here,” he says, patting his pocket. Jack takes his hand and twines their fingers together in a lovers’ knot. “And Ransom’s here, and I conveniently left my card in my room.”

“Well.” Jack takes a step out onto the porch, and Bitty follows. “Sounds like we’re off.”

“Sounds like it,” Bitty agrees, and he goes on his tiptoes. Jack meets him halfway in a kiss.

A cacophony of noise erupts behind them.

 _“Blatant_ fine, rookie mistake—”

“Ease off, losers. We’ve got a whole semester, let them have this today.”

“Get my son back safe, Zimmermann, I know where you sleep young man!”

Jack goes bright red. Bitty laughs.

“You ready?” he asks, nudging Jack’s stomach with his elbow.

It’s still snowy, and it’s bright and he has too many meal points to spend and at least thirty dollars waiting in fines, but Bitty’s hand is in his and it’s sort of perfect, actually, the way their fingers fit together.

He kisses him again, soft and lingering. Bitty squeezes his hand.

Jack says, “Always,” and they go.

________________________

**Author's Note:**

> That's that!  
> This hasn't been beta'ed so any mistakes and whatnot are all mine (and my 3:30 AM brain's). 
> 
> Please be kind, this is only my second Zimbits fic :) thanks for reading!
> 
> I'm on tumblr, [come say hi! ](http://ivecarvedawoodenheart.tumblr.com/)


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